If you expected them to slow down, start looking up

When a $100,000 heist goes sleepily unnoticed, you know you’re in strange territory.

Customers of Cannabis Road, a small but much loved marijuana-only black market on the Deep Web, woke up to news of a cyber theft on Monday morning that may leave the pot-friendly store closed for good.

“At this point, I still have no idea how the coins were stolen, or who was involved,” shop proprietor Crypto announced earlier today. “I am deeply sorry that I have failed you as a developer and a leader.”

A haul of $100,000 makes the Cannabis Road robbery just another Deep Web theft. It’s an event that pales in comparison to the $100million dollar rip-off of Sheep Marketplace in Dec. 2013, or the multimillion-dollar hack against Silk Road 2 earlier this year.

Silk Road 2.0 remains the largest black market on the block, as it has been since it launched earlier this year. Its 16,108 total products for sale (12,536 are drugs) account for approximately 27 percent of all Deep Web black market products, a drop of about 6 percent since May.

Despite its commercial success, Silk Road 2.0 is seen by many to be coasting off the reputation of the original Silk Road market. Its leaders have made a number of highly controversial decisions—the complete lack of escrow security opens customers up to easy scams, for instance—but new buyers keep coming.

Courier Market, which unlike Silk Road 2.0 has never been hacked, takes a 10 percent commission on all sales. As is the case virtually everywhere, marijuana is Agora’s biggest seller while thousands of ecstasy, stimulants, and prescription drugs attract flocks of buyers as well.

All-told, Evolution accounts for about a quarter of all products sold on the Deep Web. Its drug lists, however, make up just 18 percent of Deep Web stock in trade.

After the big three players, storefronts shrink massively. In order of total products listed, the following black markets round out the major players in the field:

• Andromeda (2,609 products, 4.5 of the Deep Web’s total)
• Cloud Nine (2351 products, 4 percent) 
• Hydra (1,542 products, 2.6 percent) 
• BlueSky (1,476 products, 2.5 percent)
• TOM Marketplace (856 products, 1.5 percent)
• The Pirate Market (421 products, .7 percent)
• Tor Bazaar (555 products, 1 percent)
• Outlaw (306 products, 0.5 percent) 
• BlackBank (303 products, 0.5 percent) 
• The Marketplace (300 products, 0.5 percent)
• Middle Earth (238 products, 0.3 percent)
• Alpaca (200 products, 0.3 percent)
• Courier Market (100 products, 0.1 percent)

Deep Web black markets remain in the crosshairs of law enforcement agencies around the world, inspiring fear, uncertainty, and doubt around everything they do. But as long as their products remain on the wish lists of millions of people in every corner of the world, there’s little reason to believe the party will end anytime soon.